Rotary disks and longitudinal sliders of this kind for retaining optical components are known for example, from DE 199 36 497 C2. A rotary disk discussed therein comprises a rotation axis as well as eight open orifices. The rotary disk possesses on its outer rim a tooth set into which the pinion of a drive motor engages in order to rotate the rotary disk about its rotation axis. Mounted on the underside of the rotary disk is a cylindrical holder having eight beveled sides, each of the beveled sides comprising a retaining mechanism for optical components, such as fluorescence filter blocks, that are to be mounted. After mounting of the optical component, it is located below an open orifice of the rotary disk. With this embodiment it is possible to retain eight optical components on the rotary disk.
Also located on the outer rim of the rotary disk according to DE 199 36 497 C2, between the open orifices, are respective detent grooves that interact with a detent apparatus mounted on the rim of the rotary disk in such a way that the rotary disk can be held in a specific position. For that purpose, the detent apparatus contains a spring-mounted ball bearing that can run along a raceway equipped with the detent grooves. Upon encountering a detent groove, a portion of the bearing engages into the groove so that a click-stop engagement results. These detent grooves are necessary for highly precise positioning of the rotary disk, and for securing in the selected position. The detent groove disclosed in the aforesaid document possesses a rectangular U-shaped profile.
V-shaped profiles for such detent grooves or detents are also known. The disadvantage of these profiles is, however, that the ball bearing enters the detent with a sharp impact, so that vibrations can occur. Furthermore, with the known profiles the capture region of the detent is small, so that the drive motor of the rotary disk cannot be stopped until click-stopping occurs.
The rotary disk described in the aforesaid document DE 199 36 497 C2, and an analogously functioning longitudinal slider with which the optical components can be held and displaced in a longitudinal direction, serve therein in particular to hold fluorescence filter blocks in a fluorescence microscope. Associated with each position is a readable code on the rotary disk that provides information as to the properties of the particular filter block that is pivoted in. The fluorescence filter blocks are pivoted into the illumination and image beam paths of the fluorescence microscope in such a way that the light of a light source is directed in filtered fashion onto a specimen, and so that light proceeding from the specimen passes, via an objective, through a further filter of the fluorescence filter block, traverses the open orifice of the rotary disk, and from there enters the eyepiece of the microscope. Whereas the subject of the aforesaid German patent application is the holders for the filter blocks, the present invention is directed toward detents, which are responsible in such a device for defined positioning of the optical components associated with the device. The intention is to overcome the disadvantages, discussed above, of the previously known detents.